Weekly Development Activities

[Marsman]

Sporkfire has released this weeks development activities.

Version 2.7 is currently in QA, undergoing its internal testing. At this point, we are unsure as to whether it will be ready to be released to the Public Test Server, as there are a few issues that need to be sorted out before we let you get your hands on them.

• We are introducing alternate vehicle loadouts, mounting different weaponry to existing vehicles. The first variants include the Fury, a Basilisk variant equipped with a fixed-forward firing rocket launcher, and a set of Empire-specific Deliverer configurations. Check them out In Development.
• The AMS is being redesigned. It will now feature two equipment terminals, a matrixing panel and a deconstruction panel. The spawn tubes are being removed, since players now spawn in the cloak bubble, not in the tubes. The AMS will retain all of its current functionality, while adding an additional equipment terminal.
• Empire Incentives are being improved. These have been described in the In Development Forum.
• Session stats are displayed on the HUD so that players can see their kill/death ratios, the amount of time played, etc.
• Tower SOIs will show up at all zoom levels on the continent map.
• Relative Population Indicators will allow players to see the population distribution of the three Empires across the world. Players will be able to view what percentage of an Empire is on a given continent.
• Continental Dominion Indicators will display at a glance which Empire holds dominion over each continent on the world map.
• An issue that caused difficulty of attaining and achieving locks with lock-on weaponry has been resolved.
• Fixed an issue that would allow implants to be used with no stamina drain.
• Changed certain properties in the texture loading process that would cause stuttering and a reduction in framerates. This should result in smoother graphical performance, particularly after first loading a continent.
• move to 2.7: The vehicle HUD has been improved. Vehicle drivers and gunners will have arrows, indicating each other's viewing direction.
• new: Toggle Animation Culling will save properly between sessions.
• new: Fixed an issue that would trigger the Empire Switch timer, even though the player had not switched Empires.
• new: Fixed an issue that would cause some avatars to become invulnerable in certain situations.
• new: Fixed an issue that would cause the chat window to scroll to the top when it is resized.

Just a note on the last bullet point: There are actually two separate issues that would be causing a performance difference since 2.4. One of them has been fixed and is heading to QA. We are hoping to resolve the second in time to release with 2.7. If we do not, we will continue working the issue out for subsequent release.
The update contents after 2.7 are continuing to be developed in design. In addition, you will likely begin seeing design features posted to the In Concept forum this week. We'll be at E3 this week, and there will likely be some information from the show to watch for. The following feature is scheduled for development after 2.8.

• Players will be able to toggle waypoints between 4 states: Fully on, No Arrow, Personal Waypoint only, Off.

Looks like 2.7 is progressing and should be another great patch.

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